There is a tale doing the rounds on social media about a supermarket closing one of its tills to alcohol sales, apparently in deference to the religious sensibilities of the checkout operator.The racists are of course up in arms about it, and talking about various protests, ranging from the sensible boycott to loading up the till with alcohol and pork products and walking off.

Is there any proper action can be taken against such racially motivated protests?

Hairyloon wrote:There is a tale doing the rounds on social media about a supermarket closing one of its tills to alcohol sales, apparently in deference to the religious sensibilities of the checkout operator.The racists are of course up in arms about it, and talking about various protests, ranging from the sensible boycott to loading up the till with alcohol and pork products and walking off.

Is there any proper action can be taken against such racially motivated protests?

In the first instance the protests would not be racially motivated. Why would a person who's religious persuasion obliges them not to sell alcohol seek employment in a place that does? If you owned an abattoir would you accept an application for a job as a slaughterman (slaughterperson?) from a person who is a vegetarian and would refuse to touch meat?

To the best of my knowledge, being cursed by Allah is considered by Muslims to be a bit of a bad thing. Employment in a shop that sells wine and pays it's employees from the profits of those sales would seem to be "eating it's price'". It would seem to me that a Muslim so devoted to Islam that they would not work on a till that sells alcohol should not be working for the shop at all. OTOH, if they were merely wanting to signal their version of virtue it might be understood. This ignores the many thousands of off licences in the country that are owned and managed by Muslims.

"I do not agree with what you say, but I'll defend to the death my right to be offended by it."

All sorts of people have reasonable adjustments made for their religious or philosophical beliefs. It doesn't seem terribly unreasonable to me that some people might be excused from selling alcohol. It would be interesting to see what attitude those so offended by this took to those cases about Christians seeking similar dispensations.

It is hardly a terrible inconvenience for people to select a checkout appropriately. What a pathetic loser someone must be to go out of their way to be offended by it.

Smouldering Stoat wrote:All sorts of people have reasonable adjustments made for their religious or philosophical beliefs. It doesn't seem terribly unreasonable to me that some people might be excused from selling alcohol. It would be interesting to see what attitude those so offended by this took to those cases about Christians seeking similar dispensations.

I'm not aware of any Christian objections to wine, indeed it is a necessary part of the ritual, literal, cannibalism of the church. If a person wants to be excused from selling alcohol on religious grounds then it seems somewhat hypocritical of them to seek employment that is contrary to their religion and then insist that part of that employment will not apply to them even though their very employment breaches their religious beliefs in the same way.

Smouldering Stoat wrote:It is hardly a terrible inconvenience for people to select a checkout appropriately. What a pathetic loser someone must be to go out of their way to be offended by it.

Fine when you have a trolley load of shopping and a few bottles of booze and her checkout is empty while others are full. That's what might be annoying. And offence might be reasonably taken at the hypocrisy of the assistant. Doesn't hypocrisy offend you? I mean other people's hypocrisy, of course.

"I do not agree with what you say, but I'll defend to the death my right to be offended by it."

shootist wrote:Fine when you have a trolley load of shopping and a few bottles of booze and her checkout is empty while others are full. That's what might be annoying. And offence might be reasonably taken at the hypocrisy of the assistant. Doesn't hypocrisy offend you? I mean other people's hypocrisy, of course.

And heaven forbid that snowflakes should be mildly annoyed. Blimey, I know that some people will go to any lengths to claim victim status, but this is ridiculous. Whatever next, will you be carrying out a suicide bombing at the 8 Items Or Less checkout?

Incidentally, shouty, roughly what proportion of the world's muslims follow the Shafi'i school of Islamic jurisprudence?

That is of no consequence in this case. What is of consequence is the hypocrisy of the shop assistant and the pusillanimous compliance of the store.

Well, if it is of no consequence then I am sure that it will not inconvenience you, whenever you quote from this text in future, to explain that it is not considered authoritative by the vast majority of the world's muslims.